The restoration of the Vehicle License Fee
and its impact on local public safety

by Bill Murray

As state officials grapple with how to resolve the current $38 billion budget crisis, in terms of local public safety a primary method of getting by this year is the proposed restoration of the Vehicle License Fee.

Back in 1998, pre-9/11 and at a time when there was a far rosier financial outlook, the state had reduced these fees, making it significantly more affordable to operate a car.

But now the Davis administration has asked for their reinstatement of these fees, which were considered temporary, back to a level that would help California survive its current budget crisis, and have presented the issue as one of public safety.

As Governor Gray Davis said, “The Vehicle License Fee pays for local police and fire. Unless that fee is returned to its 1998 level, California will experience a severe public safety emergency.”

”When the Legislature reduced this fee in '98, it said to cities and counties, ‘don't worry about local police and fire, we'll write a check for the difference. But if at any point we run out of money and we can't right a check for the difference, then the fee has to go back up automatically,’ which is exactly what is happening.”

LA County’s Sheriff Lee Baca reported, “The impact to the County is so substantial that currently my budget has a $180 million shortfall with 900 less deputy sheriffs and 200 less professional staff currently. And I've closed three jails, and I have prisoners on half-time sentences, and all the community-based policing programs have been reduced and eliminated.”

He went on to say that without the Vehicle License Fees returning to previous levels, “… the Sheriff's Department will incur another $140 million cut on top of that. And clearly, we're pretty much from the standpoint of public safety way below a minimum standard …”

He concluded, “… the gang problem is growing [and] people are committing more felonious assaults as well as murders.”

Last week Mayor James Hahn stood with a coalition of 11 City Council members, with whom he’d recently lost his own budget battle. This time they took a united position, surrounding themselves with police officers and firefighters.

The Mayor said, “To the state legislators and the governor we want to make one thing perfectly clear: If you take money from cities, what you're doing is you're taking money away that's used to hire police officers, that's used to put firefighters on their trucks."

In Sacramento Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson (D-Los Angeles/Culver City) issued a statement regarding the reinstatement of the vehicle license fee saying, “Five years ago we rolled back the car tax. We promised that it would only last as long as we had the money to keep police officers and firefighters on the street. We don't have that money anymore.”

“Unless we keep our promise, as many as 12,000 police officers or up to 15,000 firefighters will lose their jobs. No one wants to pay higher car fees. But it’s the price we must pay to keep Californians safe.”

Wesson blames the other party, “It's an outrage that Republicans -- on top of holding the budget hostage and leading a misguided recall of the governor -- now have the cops on the street in their extremist crosshairs.”

The fact is there’s a lot of finger pointing and blame going on, with state lawmakers in a stalemate about passing a state budget at all. It’s hardly a unique situation, and if they don’t find a way out of it by July 1st things will only get worse.

California will likely be forced to borrow enough money to keep the state going for a few months, reportedly $11 billion, and the interest alone will cost the taxpayers many millions.

Nearly everyone is upset about this, and well they should be.

Union groups, including the California State Employees Association, are circulating petitions to promote something called the Budget Accountability Act, which would hold the Governor and Legislature more accountable to taxpayers in order to produce more responsible and timely State budgets.

They say it’s a permanent solution for California’s ongoing budget crisis, noting that the Legislature has not met the June 15 constitutional deadline since 1986. And they want it as an initiative on the March 2004 Ballot.

It says if the state budget is not passed by the constitutional deadline, the Governor and the members of the Legislature would permanently forfeit their salary, per diem expense allowance, and car allowance for each day until the budget is adopted and signed into law.

Further, the Legislature is required to remain in session and is prohibited from acting on other legislation until the budget is adopted. An exception is made for legislation in response to an emergency declared by the Governor.

But that’s for the future, and the state, county and city have desperate needs right now … starting July 1st. The current budget proposal could reduce state revenues to California cities by $466 million statewide, and would perhaps cost Los Angeles over $40 million this year.

Increasing the Vehicle License Fee back to 1998 levels will generate $4 billion, and cost the average car owner $136 a year more. And since it’s so closely tied to supporting public safety it’s the one item in the proposed state budget that politicians, especially Democrats, will perhaps rally around.

As Davis argued, “… the fee goes back automatically to your local cities and counties to support firefighters and police chief and emergency medical services, and they would just be devastated. They couldn't function without the Vehicle License Fee.”

Republicans are calling the proposal a tax, and are determined to not let it into the budget.

And Speaker Wesson promised, “That's why, starting Monday evening, Assembly Democrats will fan out throughout California to highlight exactly what a budget without new revenues will mean -- fewer cops, larger class sizes and closed hospitals.”

Sheriff Baca said without the Vehicle License Fee adjustment, “We will, quite frankly, not be able to do the job that we are required to do.”

Last week, as she stood flanked by fellow council members and the Mayor, Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski tried to bury the hatchet after the recent veto of the city budget. "We are saying with one voice Los Angeles needs to be the safest large city in the U.S."

Chief William J. Bratton was with Mayor Hahn as he traveled to Sacramento at weeks end to meet other mayors and public safety officials from around the state, urging Governor Davis and state legislators to oppose severe and ongoing cuts to cities.

“We are all united in telling the Governor and our State Legislators – do not take away our police officers. Do not take away our firefighters. Our thin blue line is already thin enough,” said Mayor Hahn.

“In Los Angeles,” he said, “the cuts on the table mean the city would lose funding for anywhere from 350 to 750 police officers, fire fighters, or paramedics.”